Art & Words 2020
- Robert Langdon
- Apr 14, 2020
- 26 min read
EXHIBITION STATEMENT
The power of one form of art over another fascinates me. Many art forms — visual arts, literary arts, music — carry the influence of those that came before and it’s always exciting for me to discover the little pieces of one artist informing another.
For this exhibition, I invited a few visual artists and poets with whom I have worked in the hopes that their art would inspire one another to create. The artists and poets were given the opportunity to submit existing art and poetry. The art was sent to poets and poetry sent to the artists who selected poems or pieces of art that spoke to them from the submitted work. Participants were then asked to create a new piece of art—be it a visual art piece or poem—based on the original inspiration. All of the artists and poets that are participating in Art & Words rely heavily on visuals and I knew that pairing their art form with another would be successful. I wasn’t disappointed. Art & Words holds something for everyone in both visual and written forms.
I wish to personally thank the those that came together to make Art & Words one of my favorite exhibitions, and to those artists who brought my own poetry to life and to another level. I have been told by many artists and poets that they were challenged and that the project was a great creative reward. Please view the exhibition and spend some
time looking deep into both the poetry and artwork to see the connections made between the artists and poets. Hopefully you too will discover your own connections.
Robert P. Langdon, Curator
April 2020
(click on image for more information and to purchase)
Tina Piccolo
Poet In Ruins
Collage and oil on cradled wood
16" x 16"
Inspired by the poem Poet In Ruins
Jack Braunlein
Poet In Ruins (2020)
Acrylic on canvas on panel
12" x 12"
Inspired by the poem Poet In Ruins
Geta Badea
Il mio Giocondo
raw antique cotton, clear and white gesso, charcoal, pen, several types of gel medium and liquid glass medium, clear oil sticks, oils, marouflage(d) on wood cradled masonite panel
48" x 24.5"
Inspired by the poem Poet In Ruins
Painted on antique cotton weaved by my maternal grandma from cotton grown on their farm and weaved by her on a horizontal, manual loom built by grandpa. I remember, as a kid, her teaching me to weave on it for hours and hours and never get tired. I wish, I could bring that loom home, here but it probably was given away or even destroyed after their passing away. Both of my grandmas nowadays would have been hailed as great fabric and rug and tapestry weavers. Unfortunately, I never recognized their talent until I started painting! – Geta Badea
Poet In Ruins
a tormented soul
trapped in an ancient life,
as the world moves on,
tangled trees and vines,
allow themselves the liberty
to overtake her home,
oppressive icy stone wall,
and weathered wrought iron,
panes freed of their
leaded windows,
doors rusted open
like her pained heart,
she writes effortlessly
in the old style,
with a sharp feather,
and liquid as dark
as her scars
– © Michelle DeCicco
Geta Badea
La mia Gioconda — The Vain One
raw cotton, acrylics, watercolors, gesso, gel mediums, silver and shining reflecting mediums, charcoal, Stabilo pencils, oil sticks marouflage(d) on Masonite panel and wood cradles
51" x 26.5"
Inspired by the poem Vanity
Vanity
They found you sprawled across the bathroom floor.
Your wrinkled face brushing smooth tile.
You didn’t have time to put on your wig.
It was on your nightstand lovingly placed
atop the styrofoam stand-in awaiting tease and spray.
Did you forget about your appointment that morning?
If you had remembered, would you have kept your wig on,
wrapped it in toilet paper and slept on your back
with your hands folded over your bosom so your elbows
would keep you from rolling over onto your stomach?
If you had known, would you have made yourself pretty
to be made prettier the way you did before visiting the beauty parlor?
Applied mascara to your brittle lashes so that each time your gay
hairdresser flirted, they would appear strong and supple
when you batted them? Outlined your lips above their sagging crowns
and colored between the lines with the red of desire?
If you had known about your appointment today,
would you have put your life in order like the nail polish organized
by shade? Spent your last hours with your children and their children
offering one lasting hug and ‘I love you’?
Or would you have mixed yourself a Tom Collins and spent that time
looking into the mirror, fussing over yourself, and getting ready?
— © Robert P Langdon
Ann Morris
Proof (2020)
Paper collage and acrylic on board
12" x 12"
Inspired the poem The Hidden Sex
The Hidden Sex
Victims?
Hidden children, girls,
Innocence tower bound in their youth.
But, in their adolescence,
secretly practicing
Sun and Moon Goddess worship
Hands flung up
In close proximity
Creating spider web constellations
Mixing magic and menstruation
Sensuously in thrall with their own bodies
Growing the parts of them they could signal with.
Hair equals lust equals sin equals freedom
Princess or peasant the story starts the same
She was sin-sational slipping
Behind gauzy panels at the narrowest window
Rapunzel
Vocalizations of honey and musk
Lead to blinded eyes and
Dresses that need to be loosened
Saule freed by the Zodiac,
Left Scorpio crimson coloring the scene with lustful eyes
sledge swinging.
Rudaba lowered dark hair chains
Proposing Confidante chaperoned conversations
awakened love and defiance.
Petrosinella, proficient with poppies
Gold ladder beckoning
Repeatedly romancing the besotted prince
Someone is craving
Someone commits a crime
someone is sacrificed
the innocent are punished
someone is found
someone escapes
someone is left,
and there is a joining.
– © Natalie Boburka, 2020
Yvonne Rojas-Cowan
Catrina Selfie (2019)
Acrylic on canvas
12" x 12"
Inspired the poem Behind the Camera
Behind the Camera
When we were hearts
Our hearts were flowers
Dark Charged ribs
Encased such power
Priestess cool assessing gaze
Deity lost no offerings claimed
Smugly crowns her head raised
Hair spun wild coils inflamed.
Bird whisper shoulder and color glazed
Grows a garden and hides her pain
tattooed skin cloak pattern blazed
Camouflage magic and pretends she’s tamed.
– © Natalie Boburka, 2020
Yvonne Rojas-Cowan
Lost In the Colors of My Soul (2020)
Acrylic on canvas
20" x 19"
Inspired by the poem Come
Come
I’ve travelled through the shades of red —
the pink of birth and the blush of adolescence.
The candy of passion, the rose of love
and the scarlet stench of loss.
I’ve swayed with the blues all of my life —
the electric coolness of cobalt. The back and forth
mania of indigo calming itself down to an azure
and finally finding peace in the tranquility of periwinkle.
The yellows have always energized me —
they feed me the sun and keep me smiling. I have gone
one on one with butterscotch but can sometimes be a whole
grain mustard. I am part sour lemon part sappy honey. But all golden.
The greens have always been a challenge — I’ve protested
the army and hunters. Chopped the basils and mints.
My toes have been tickled by moss and my senses
titillated by chartreuse. The greens have been friend and foe.
But these days the colors are beginning to blend and create new hues.
My footprints have oxidized into a mixture of vibrancy and grey.
Darker patches streaking and stroking beckon me to come.
But they took that away from me. I can’t anymore.
— © Robert P. Langdon
Yvette Lewis
Memory of Singing (2020)
Acrylic on paper
20" x 13"
Inspired by the poem Clio's Song: A Prayer
Clioʼs Song: A Prayer
Come in you weary traveler and rest your mind awhile
Your offering is sweet and tender though
Born through a weary mile,
And I can restore your memory to things long lost in time,
And I will have you inscribe your thoughts in fine and measured line,
Then I will restring your lyre for you and tune to an ancient mode,
So you could sing your song for me before you head out on your road.
Much later in your travels, when Time and Road run out,
And you come back to me with your mind in clouds of doubt,
Then I will reveal the memory from those who have gone before
That shines yet bright and brilliant and will forever more.
And it will be a beacon to you still when your time and space upend For
the road goes on forever and the journey never ends.
— © Jack Braunlein
Loel Barr
Lemons (2020)
Digital photography
11" x 14"
Inspired by the poem Thoughts On Lemons As Mother Reads the New Yorker And the Cancer Is Still Only a Single Cell in Her Lungs
Thoughts on Lemons as Mother Reads the New Yorker
And the Cancer Is Still Only a Single Cell in Her Lung
Lemons sliced thin beside the penguin
ice bucket, Cinzano Vermouth, Gordon’s
Dry Gin. Slice me a lemon, Dear?
Mother’s hand raised as I hold the lemon
perfect in the palm of mine, rolling.
The evergreen orange citron mix
elliptic protruding nipple apex. Stacked
in yellow grocery bins trucked in from
leaves, thorned, spreading. Faintly pitted,
slightly ribbed fine-grained tender sunken
oil glands’ secret skin, bitter pith hidden
beneath. How could we know? Juice soaked
sections, flesh encased inside, yellow
radiating segments in a crystal dish. How
could we even ask? Returning with
Crusaders from Palestine, golden seeds
on Spanish sailing ships, have you watched
us these two thousand years your true home
unknown? They withhold water until you wilt,
then surge it through to induce a second bloom.
Can you hear the earthworms in silt and loam?
Do you fear crinkly leaf, heart rot, purple scab,
twist of witherlip, wild rabbits. What begins in
the universe of a singe cell, crooked atoms
that spin into endless black space? (I am
sometimes that little.) I sink my serrated
knife into feathery flesh pockets pitted
in the smudged shine. Fragrant glands burst
pungent, as Mother lights up another Lucky.
(Do you fear the smallest things?)
— © Anique Sara Taylor
Natalie Boburka
Dreaming of Lilith
Assemblage
38" x 18" x 16"
Inspired by the poem The Voice of Lilith
The Voice of Lilith
They teach you to fold linen napkins.
Place each one between salad and dinner
plate. Seat male next to female to male.
Spoon mousse into fluted crystal.
Press your father’s shirts, yoke first.
Then seam. Button facing. Cuff.
Match socks, warm from the dryer,
as if that is all there is.
They warn you of my needle talons
to kidnap children in the night.
To a place of thorns, thistles, nettles,
Owl shadows, where night birds gather
and no one has ever been so alone.
You sleep to the symphony of tree frogs,
from the swamp behind your house
as cocktail voices merge into midnights.
You race down dream hills into the wind,
to fly above broken branches as I whisper
into the solar system of your cells.
In the unfolded morning your shy mouth
sewn shut, your thirsty heart tries to
remember. They try to convince you
I don’t exist, afraid they will discover —
Each night, as the edge of suburban surface
fades and dark matter begins to form,
you pray for me to carry you away.
— © Anique Sara Taylor
Josepha Gutelius
Green Thumb (2020)
Acrylic on canvas
16" x 20"
Inspired by the poem Eden
Eden
This time
She was all thought and no action
Theoretically her faith in an actively
Peaceful Planet
had taken enough hits to be
spit out by now
Just a spreading stain on the pavement.
She began to look intently
for signs
of Spring
She could seal the deal
by feasting on bursting dandelions
and surreal daffodil visions
Spot an eagle and she could
last for a week.
If things got really bad
she could always
Walk
Naked and Serpentless
in the Garden.
— © Natalie Boburka
Josepha Gutelius
Blinded By the Light (2020)
Acrylic on canvas
16" x 20"
Inspired by the poem Blinded By the Light
Ellen McKay
Take My Hand (2020)
Acrylic on cradled panel
16" x 16"
Inspired by the poem Blinded By the Light
Blinded By the Light
Hold my hand
and we will make it through this world
of vivid colors
shadowed eyes
and caterpillar lashes.
This world that they want
us to join
of questioning morals
renegade artists
and wastely ways.
Stick with me
as we start our journey
but be aware. For they are out
to hook you with their promises
of democracy, freedom, and bikinis.
Keep your feet grounded and face covered
and do not expose your self.
For we will finish this passage
that our forefathers foretold.
And we will remain golden.
— © Robert P Langdon
Ellen McKay
New Map (2020)
Acrylic and charcoal on linen on cradled panel
20" x 24"
Inspired the poem
New Map: Haiku for Peggy Wright
My pathway tangled,
Then she gave me a new map.
Look! The page is blank!
My map gone, destroyed.
Who guides by moon, stars, or heart?
Blue angel flying!
Monday. Dogs baying.
Stillness hangs over rooftops,
There! Eagle in flight
Grey clouds move slowly
Wrapped in shrouds, a new burden,
What a gorgeous day!
Red maple outside
Today, bright, sunny, flaming,
I am a willow.
Shadows on my wall
She told me about the cave,
What’s that behind me?
If he is not here
How can I kill the Buddha?
Children are laughing.
— © Jack Braunlein
Jack Braunlein
Within the Sky Earth (2020)
Acrylic on paper
10.5" x 14.5"
Inspired the poem
Sky Within Earth
I am inside the earth. Am I buried? Am I covered by sack-cloth dirt, a mud-shroud
of my own making? I look up, openings give onto sky, clear blue, pale as a sigh,
a sigh of relief to see the outer world now made of Ether. Ether of my own making?
I could rise up from my grave and be counted among those who hear the call---to be
churned into peaks by strong hands, hands that pound me, thwack me down on the
table, roll me out flat, roll me up into coils, fold me, knead me pound me again until
I am solid, nary an air bubble left. So I won’t explode. It’s not over yet. Large hands of
my own making? Now what? I’m a mound of clay spinning on the wheel, deft fingers
pull me up little by little slippery slick coaxing my form, rounding my belly, narrowing
my neck, broadening my mouth. A gasp of surprise. Now I have curved walls, an inside.
I slide into the kiln, stand up in the heat as the fires rage. Fires of my own making? It’s
not over yet. I glow red in the blast. On and on and I am white hot, then pink. Now I
am cooling down. I can hold water. I can hold grain, flowers. What do you mean,
“there’s more”!? I thought I was done. A sigh of pleasure as the glazes flow cool over
my body. I am splashed, splattered, painted. At eight-hundred celsius flames dress me
in glass garments. I emerge, radiant, my drips hold depths, like water running down my
sides --waters of my own making? Called, I came to wear green and cream and yellow,
Sancai colors with small spaces left bare. Am I ready to accompany the living in their
daily ceremonies, honor the dead, buried with them— be a gift, bequeathed, lost,
remembered, unearthed, cherished? Have I become a real vessel? The water is cold;
the peonies, fragrant.
— © Ellen McKay
Ken Tannenbaum
Single Wide With View (2019)
Photography
21" x 17"
Inspired the poem crushed trust
crushed trust
the twinkle in your eyes
captured my heart
the words you whispered
spoke of my reveries
you promised me everything
i was blinded
i didn’t see
you mesmerized me into your dream
there was writing
on the walls
i couldn’t read
you wrapped me up
so very tightly
into your scheme
promises
that never materialized
promises
falsehoods disguised
you spoke of homes
and gardens
and me dripping in jewels
lots of kids in our yard
2 dogs, a cat and a bird
and for my quiet place
a she shed out back
the plans
for vacations
that never occurred
and when inquired
you claimed
me a shrew
disappointed
crushed
gave up
but you
with that twinkle in your eyes
whispered
dear
a surprise
pack your belongings
we move on the morrow
we drove
we drove
we drove for a week
far from a city
suburb or town
passing through
small villages
and many bare plots
envisioning
a castle
high on some hill
overlooking
a crystal-clear lake
rather than
ending here
his secret dream
in a trailer
with a view
— © gwynneth green
Loel Barr
Flea (2020)
Oil on canvas
11" x 14"
Inspired the poem Mable
Mable
Mable
Mable
I need you to
scout out
the other tables
what are they vending
is their stuff
as good as ours
do they have a complete set
of Corningware
do the dishes have chips
what prices are on the tags and slips
Mable
you need to be
incognito
put on the red wig
big hat and sunglasses
lower your voice
when you ask about
the cut-glass
don’t be surprised
if they question your knowledge
sound confused
that shouldn’t be
hard for you
Mable
my dear
return as a stranger
and please be alert
when someone asks me
about a porcelain figurine
try to haggle a bit
so they compete
don’t fight too hard
we want them to win
going home
treasure in hand
with a snicker and grin
Mable
my sweetheart Mable
this is your chance
to show what you’ve got
gather the intel
so we can leave
with cash in
our tin box
— © gwynneth green
Loel Barr
Twin Peaks (2020)
Oil on canvas
11" x 14"
Inspired the poem Meet Me in the Cave of Your Heart
Meet Me In The Cave of Your Heart
The gentle green of it will do us good.
The watery view will calm us.
It's hard to tell if the light-lit river is circling
in or flowing out, and does not matter.
My heart, too, will be there, listening
to yours in the dark.
Purple shadows, lingering on edges
of the visible light, will intrigue us.
Protected from the reach of tyrants
who have no caverns of their own in which to rest,
we will be able to hear your lungs
drawing in the good, clean air.
My lungs, too, will hold
the volume tight before
we let out quiet song
into the shape of a swirl.
— © Ana C H Silva
Ann Morris
Ticket Updated (2020)
Paper collage and acrylic on board
12" x 12"
Inspired by the poem Ticket Updated
Will Nixon
Ticket Updated
Photography
inspired by the poem Ticket Updated
Ticket Updated
shriven universe of feeble rhapsody,
as countrymen stomp from themselves.
flaxen
tangerines,
combination
in grape.
lurk? sip?
a thief caper?
by abdomen,
its aeronautic waistline
was indissoluble--
whereon the arching
brewery out-hooched me.
a crappie,
a cramp.
any deacons are a neck,
rerouting was astral.
— © Loel Barr
Will Nixon
Untitled
Photography
inspired a poem by Michelle DeCicco
Hi, can we talk?
we don’t have much time!
sit down and listen, you haven’t taken
Mother Earth seriously, so I’ve stepped in
everyone has to be
on the same page
you all will listen to me
during this new age
no more destroying trees, in any rainforest
no more dumping anything, in any body of water
no more littering anywhere
every government has to behave, only do good for our
Earth, support the hemp and bamboo companies
support the ocean cleaning companies
everyone only uses renewable energies
no new pipelines and no more wars!
everyone must heed
these laws put forth
the words of this creed
comes from the north
no one shall defy the ancients
or I will lose my patience
we all must work as one
or our Earth will be un-done
– © Michelle DeCicco
Loel Barr
Fly Away
Digital painting
11" x 14"
inspired by the poem When I Had It Made
Marjorie Magid
Boy On a Roof
Acrylic on canvas
22" x 28"
inspired by the poem When I Had It Made
When I Had It Made
I had loose teeth that became nickels
under my pillow, a wooden trunk filled
with plastic pirate gear, and a black eye patch
my mother wouldn't let me wear
to second grade. I trapped crickets
in jelly jars and fed them grass blades,
until they died and joined
my collection of dried star fish, rocket stamps,
and Canadian pennies. I practiced lassoing
with the laundry line and almost caught
the squirrel my mother hated for running
in the roof gutters whenever
she tried to nap. One day I crawled
out from my window and climbed
the sandpapery roof shingles
to the crest of the house,
where I sat practicing for an unsaddled horse,
and saw things I'd never seen before:
the daisy window for the neighbor's attic
filled with lamps; the green hills
hunched like ants along the horizon,
where I bet some Indians still lived.
When the paper boy came, he didn't see me spying
and didn't know a black lab was racing
around the corner after his pants.
When Dad walked home, whistling
and swinging his briefcase, he didn't see me
almost as high as the crows.
He carried his gin-and-tonic onto the patio,
opened the newspaper to the little league scores,
and told my mother in the kitchen
the next library lecture was about robins.
When I grew up, I decided, I would be an angel
who watched people like this all day.
I saw the first star at the end of the blue sky
and didn't come down,
until the sunset
put the smallest clouds to sleep.
— © Will Nixon
Marjorie Magid
I Dreamt They Were My Friends
Acrylic on canvas
24" x 18"
inspired the poem When I Dreamt It
i dreamt it
was it so long ago
that we 4
would party
on the floor
we swore
to forever friends
we were 10
one lanky
one flighty
one rather small
and i in the middle
of you all
never imagining
age changes everything
some girls become bitches
others turn into witches
best are the princesses
who might not always be right
but never wrong
the artist of course
painting them as sweet innocents
blinded and bonded by friendship
unable to recollect
at all
those traits
in we 4
never imagining
time changes everything
marriages
divorces
kids or not
spits and spats
jealousies and rages
texting and chats
physiques changing
minds forget
unwillingness to accept
because
believing this a dream
means
i dreamt they were my friends
— © gwynneth green
Theresa Landi Daniel
...No Time For Talking
Mixed media and handmade paper
inspired the poems
Discourse without Words
I time my breathing
to inhale your warm exhale.
It smells earthy, soft and reliable,
and warm, so warm.
You breathe out...and I
breathe in.
I sigh, and sometimes smile.
This is the most affectionate
you ever are -
Breathing, evenly and fragrantly,
while you sleep,
And not minding that I am there
because you are unaware.
This letting out and taking in by turns
is our quiet-time conversation,
measured and calm,
first you…, then me….
You do not know my face is so close,
and I will never tell you….
We are still in love in the middle of the night
because I will it so.
And because nothing short of
“death do us part”
will interfere in this exchange
of shared breath.
— © Theresa Landi Daniel
No Time for Talking
you called
i didn’t pick up
you left a voice message
hey sweetie
it seems like forever
i know we talked yesterday
but so much more to say
give me a call
when you have a few minutes
talk to you later
bye bye
you sent a text
just called
i didn’t respond
next was an e-mail
need to talk
please call as soon as you can
that went to spam
you sent a message
via facebook
you’re on FB right now
i see the green dot
by your name
been leaving messages
all over the place
what’s up
you ok
please answer
i have lots to say
i turned off the computer
the ipad and phone
hoping the message
would get through
— © gwynneth green
Shelley Davis
Ancestors
Mixed media on canvas
16" diameter
inspired the poems Ancestors
Ancestors
centuries and decades
pass through us
threads linking our
souls and hearts
bound forever
to our ancestors
fitting together
in the most surprising of ways
like a patchwork quilt
linking our dreams
our ancestors
leaving us with messages
from their knowing
giving us guidance
to a greater understanding
learning from our past
ancestors linking our
threads
forever bound
heart and soul
– © Michelle DiCicco
Ancestors
A group of wraithlike figures,
some single, some in groups
drift in the sky
among spherical shapes
of sun and a clock,
seemingly timeless, although
the women in cloche hats,
the men in ‘bathing costumes’ below
could be our ancestors, just as
the ghostlike figures in the sky
could be both theirs and ours.
How strange and sad: we know
our ancestors only
from their letters and portraits,
and admire them as
‘eminences grises', grey eminences,
though we can’t know
their deepest thoughts and feelings
as they can’t know
even of our existence, beyond
two generations ahead
or three at most.
Did they try
to live like the Iroquois
and have “always in view…
the coming generations?”
If so, those hopes
were gutted by greed,
by the imagined need
for faster cars,
dishwashers, microwaves,
plastics amassing,
choking the earth—
the 1920’s group depicted
seem relieved, freed from strictures
like cravats and corsets…and yet
do their tentative smiles
mask fears and doubts
about the future, a longing
to follow the Spirit Way
of walking softly on the fragile earth?
— © Elizabeth Shafer
Shelley Davis
My Landscape
Mixed media on canvas
24" x 24"
inspired by the poem paint a poem
Jean Campbell
The Words Swirled (2020)
Oil on board
35" x 22"
inspired by the poem paint a poem
paint a poem
paint a poem
use colors
that fuse thoughts
creating shapes
forming
a breathless affirmation
be bold
with your brush
daub with gold and green
crafting a hidden meaning
that tugs at one’s heart
be fearless
blot
splotch
smear
splatter
your creativity
on the canvas
let your imagination soar
with fine lines
surprise the art lovers
surprise yourself
don’t let your mind be confused
let the muse
communicate
the vibrant missive
please
paint me a poem
— © gwynneth green
Andrea Geller
Reynisfjara (2020)
Watercolor
12" x 16"
inspired the poem Reynisfjara
Reynisfjara
low lying clouds set against
jagged sea cliffs, offers a
foreboding feeling,
poised with much strength,
against thundering winds,
the determined traveler
trudges, heading towards the
colossal rock formations,
sloshing through black sand,
do not trust yourself, your senses,
to turn away from these
unforgiving waves, soaring Atlantic
sprays are seen smashing into
ancient monoliths, intense
deafening surf devours the
dark beach, as the monster
waves recede only
shadows remain
– © Michelle DeCicco
Andrea Geller
Feel the Waves (2020)
Watercolor
12" x 16"
inspired by the poem Vibrations
jd weiss
becoming the waves
Medium format photography — archival pigment print on panel
20" x 20"
inspired by the poem Vibrations
Vibrations
rolling in
foam, gathering
at the crests,
white merging
the blues, and greens
spreading out pounding,
as it greets the shore
rolling, salt
rocking shells,
sand pulling back
close, your eyes
feel the waves
— © Michelle DeCicco
jd weiss
beyond the field
Medium format photography — archival pigment print on panel
20" x 20"
inspired by the poem Beyond Ideas
Beyond Ideas
We come whirling like a dervish out of nothing
There is a field beyond ideas,
I'll meet you there
As we walk in
Love the lotus falls before us
There is a field beyond ideas,
I'll meet you there
I'll meet you there...
— © Ad Augeri
jd weiss
The Long Wait
Medium format photography — archival pigment print on panel
20" x 20"
inspired the poems The Long Wait and devoted
The Long Wait
when will she return?
my heart aches till I
see her again,
I’m so hungry and cold,
remembering when she
brought me home,
she held me in her arms,
I was always jumping, to give
her licks on her wrinkled,
face and hands,
she always gave me hugs
and belly rubs,
loved sitting next to her,
when she watched tv,
never pulled her when we
walked together, except to
protect her from squirrels,
always gave her my fullest
attention while she ate,
always made sure she was
warm when she slept,
wondering where those people took her,
I’m so cold,
she needs me
– © Michelle DeCicco
devoted
she waited
for what seemed like years
she waited
patiently
uncomplaining
without contempt
she waited
for the phone to ring
it rarely did
she waited
for flowers to come
they seldom did
she waited
for loving words
they never were said
she lost herself
in another’s life
with blinders
tied tight
she couldn’t see left or right
she waited
to be recognized
she waited
to be saved
he who waited
patiently
daily
saved her sanity
recognizing
her weaknesses
he comforted her
with eagerness
a paw
a lick
of endearment
– © Gwynneth Green
Robert P Langdon
Hands Up
iPhone photography
12" x 12"
inspired the poem Hands Up
hands up
pay attention
here are the rules
1 your answer is your left hand up
2 you do not speak your answer is your left hand up
3 if yes is the answer raise your left hand
who understands
hey you
you in the back
do you understand
don’t nod your head
hand up if you do
i’ll start over
pay attention
here are the rules
1 your answer is your left hand up
2 you do not speak your answer is your left hand up
3 if yes is the answer raise your left hand
4 you do not nod your head your answer is your left hand up
who understands
hey you
you again
you in the back
do you understand
don’t shrug your shoulders
one more time
pay attention
here are the rules
1 your answer is your left hand up
2 you do not speak your answer is your left hand up
3 if yes is the answer raise your left hand
4 you do not nod your head your answer is your left hand up
5 you do not shrug your shoulders your answer is your left hand up
this is not a test
maybe it should be
if you can’t respond correctly
you will have to leave
are you an idiot
pause while waiting for a hand
are you an imbecile
pause while waiting for a hand
are you a moron
4 hands up
at least i know 4 are listening
are you a genius
hey you
you again
you in the back
with your right hand up
stand up
state your name
and
say something to prove your status
a cough
a clearing of the throat
a stammer
a mumble
my name …….Einstein
— © Gwynneth Green
Robert P Langdon
Curio Cabinet
iPhone photography
12" x 12"
inspired the poem Curio Cabinet
Curio Cabinet
Light seeping through the dust,
particles floating dreamily,
the prayers of our forebearers
gathered in one place.
Pale porcelain dolls,
unblinking,
Witness to a century of change,
are nestled among
examples of American ingenuity
gone silent.
Crockery that once clattered
on a busy table,
tongs to lift the logs
glowing to ash
as dinner cooked
on the hearth,
and the finest glassware,
proof of prosperity and education,
left, abandoned,
in the company of dust.
— © Jean Campbell
Curio Cabinet
It was a hot day in the summer of 68 and we were driving the back roads of South Jersey with the windows down and the hot humid air pouring all around us when this old house came into view and this sign out front said Antiques Collectibles Curios of all kinds and Nikki goes oh Joey stop it’ll be such fun so Joe pulls over and we all got out of the car but when we went inside things got strange because the windows were all down and there was no ac and it was stifling hot and there were these tables all set up with china plates and cups and figurines and all this junk that people must have thrown away years ago and I remember these clocks that were all ticking out of synch like they had been set at different times and there were these really strange dolls and manikins sitting and standing and staring at us with frozen expressions and unblinking eyes and then this old man came shuffling out with broken down slippers and a dirty strappy t-shirt and he says good to see you hope you’ll stay and he goes over to this old wind-up Victrola and put on a 78 and started singing along and looking at us and laughing and the old man kept changing records and the room seemed to get hotter and hotter and we’re milling around this place with the clocks and the china and the manikins and the heat and I guess I must have freaked out or something because next thing I remember is us running outa there and jumping into the car with lots of nervous laughter but as we were pulling out Nikki goes oh God Joey look and up there in an attic window staring at us was a human form a manikin of a young girl one hand raised up against a pane of glass and her eyes staring blindly at the road ahead.
— © Jack Braunlein
Lesley Bodzy
Infinity (2019)
Mixed media on aluminum panel
18" x 24"
inspired the poem Infinitude
infinitude
unwrap
unplug
detach
disconnect
uncover
refocus
discover
find
free
your mind
wander limitlessly
open
to boundless
possibilities
establishing
an unrestricted place
where inspiration
is fed
by the unexpected
effortless flow
when letting go
becoming one
with the muse
creativeness
streams
colors blend
missives materialize
in an infinite union
— © Gwynneth Green
Lesley Bodzy
Sea (2019)
Acrylic on aluminum panel
12" x 12"
inspired the poem Sea
Sea
my footsteps sink in
as I take them
towards the soft waves
the vast sea foam
shaded ocean
lifts my heart’s connection
body slowly folds
into the sand
rolling into my being
the waves
penetrate every sense
smelling the salt
increases my hunger
all awakens the core
of my soul
as I give myself
freely to the
Sea
– © Michelle DeCicco
Lesley Bodzy
Mad Chemist (2020)
Acrylic on aluminum panel
12.75" x 12.75"
inspired by the poem Mad Chemist
Mad Chemist
In the basement I fought World War One in dirt trenches
spread by trowel on the pool table. My metal soldiers
survived firecrackers catapulted by spoons, dive bomb
hand attacks by my little brother, earthquakes from our knees
drumming under the table. My father stopped the war
when Rex the cat began pooping in the dirt: “Your mother
doesn't want you playing in bacteria.”
So I played mad chemist. I'd invent acid for burning
open safes; freezing fluids for ants, worms, and girls toes.
From brown bottles racked in my chemistry set, I mixed
bad odors and slow fizzles, but nothing burned from matches
dropped down blackened tubes. After my brother ratted,
my father locked the set in his closet: “Your mother
wants you to become a doctor, not a bomb maker.
Think about eating breakfast with no fingers.”
I picked his closet with a paper clip and took my chemistry set
to the swamp with a bottle of Mountain Dew to mix my brother
a surprise. This formula would turn his hair blue, soften his teeth
like rubber. I drank my half of the Mountain Dew, then his half,
and held the bottle under slimy water, making it gurgle, until
a mucky head rose, a snapping turtle hooked like a claw.
My brother found the chemistry set in the swamp snow
rusty as an old can with spilled bottles of smelly ice.
My father punished me with no television for polluting
a wetland. He didn't know the secret of the snapping turtle:
sipping chemicals, glowing green, breathing fire.
— © Will Nixon
Josepha Gutelius
The American Poet (2020)
Acrylic on canvas
16" x 20"
Inspired by the poem An American Poet
An American Poet
I envied her for her perfect poetry, but I envied her even more when she stopped
writing. She stopped, just like that. After getting the prize. Who does that? You’re a
genius, I would tell her, being tormented is normal. I couldn’t imagine being her, such
brilliance, such exhaustion, she could barely make it out of bed. Or another way she put
it:
I wish I could squeeze the marshmallow out of the camel.
I would say, Stay in bed, or get out of bed, what’s the difference? She didn’t need
to have a job, due to the prize. So she had all the time in the world to be silent.
She used to stay up all night, heard voices. The voices spoke in perfect poetry,
she just needed to write fast.
She had an epiphany one night alone in her apartment, she told me, when she
felt the Hand of Blake. And that was the night she stopped writing. What is the point of
reaching five people in Tribeca, she said to me. She needed a stadium to preach to! So:
she came up with a plan: she would start writing poems again, at least for a little while
longer, and then write stories and then a novel and then write the definitive history of
quantum biology as it relates to pre-Christian theology and she’d... etcetera etcetera
etcetera etcetera etcetera.
Well.
She moved back to her hometown, got on disability, and defined herself as
someone without a past and started a hedge fund. A success, by all accounts. She
dropped all contacts -- with me, with all her other friends. Now what I have is this, her
last letter to me.
November 6, 1977
(quote): I feel that I am now, well, I’ve now been given, bequeathed, this heady
gift, what I live for, and in that state of eternal soft bubbling anxiety, that before I’ve
known only when in the throes of love-longing, that gift is that I feel I’ll someday be able
to write with the near mathematical accuracy of a musician -- an algebra of passion. But
I sometimes have flashes of Ouspenskian paranoia that some external herd instinct will
drag me down.
— © Josepha Gutelius
Josepha Gutelius
My life had stood a loaded gun
Acrylic on canvas
24" x 16"
Inspired the poem My Life had stood—a Loaded Gun—, by Emily Dickinson
“My Life had stood—a Loaded Gun—”, by Emily Dickinson
I am the woman
holding the hand
of the man
holding the gun.
I am the woman
holding the gun.
I am the gun
loaded, cocked,
ready to blast
through the smiles, curtseys,
niceties, hypocrisies
of which my life
has been composed.
Until now, as I hear
The words of powerful men
telling me who
and how to love,
when and how
to bear children
while the white light of rage
flares in me. And I look
down the long barrel
of my gun and of time
and see a sister, a Senator
opposing a racist vote
and another Senator, another
powerful man, trying to silence her.
“Nevertheless, she persisted,” he sneers.
Yes, persisted and prevailed—
As her words and mine will live
through time—burning
through lies— to truth.
— © Elizabeth Shafer
Meredith Morabito
They Call It Empathy
Clay sculpture
15" x 3" x 5"
inspired the poem An Empathic Figure
An Empathic Figure
she stood flat, against the wall, striving to support, more than possible, unwavering to her mission, since her creation, kind and understanding, to all, her alabaster body, revealing her true self, soul body mind, sight unnecessary, she feels their entireties, pains joys maladies, her giving heart and soul, glows from within, and illuminates her, body aura, growing more, to heal many.
— © Michelle DeCicco
Elaine Ralston
Shining Dark (2020)
Pastel
17" x 14"
inspired by the poem Mnemosyne
Linda Lynton
Memories (2020)
Oil on canvas
Diptych: 16" x 12" (each canvas is 8" x 6")
inspired by the poem Mnemosyne
Mnemosyne
Soft loam, leaf dust, step by step,
Your feet sink into the forest ground,
Now that you’ve returned
To the land where you were born,
Familiar scents – pine needles, log-mold, moss-earth,
The roof over your head
Is a native woods, a canopy of stars
Spilling late summer light,
A single cirrus cloud trails in the ink-blue sky,
White bird on a distant lake — an afterthought,
A smudge, a sidelong glance
On waters, heavy and silent, shining dark
As memory, I, Mnemosyne, Mother of the Muses,
Would crown you with the light of
All the faces of those you love.
— © Ellen McKay
Linda Lynton
Six canvases (2020)
Oil on canvas
4" x 4"
inspired by the poem You
YOU
Meadows lined with grass green
Flowers paint a rare scene
Shackles sawn asunder
Lightning with her thunder
Sunset sky purple hue
Serene ocean dressed blue
I thought this was beauty
Then I saw You
— © Ad Augeri
Edward Berkise
I Think We See Things Differently (2020)
Collage, watercolor and marker
9.5" x 13"
inspired by the poem I Think We See Things Differently
I Think We See Things Differently
I think we wade where
it’s wet and warm
where the pulse comes from
we feel rhythms from
a beating muscle under the heart
originations in compassion and conscience
I think they see things differently
I think they tread on
white boney structures
stripped of fleshy dreams
An empty cage heated by
the echoes
of remembered battles.
I think our heroes are different
Found in healing words,
sacred arts, endless
nurturing.
I think they worship differently
Offering Prayers on battlefields,
conference rooms, huddled in hidden places,
from towers in the sky.
I think we need two words for
Humans
Male and female don’t begin to cut it
— © Natalie Boburka
Edward Berkise
Tree In South Carolina (2020)
Watercolor and colored pencil
11" x 15"
inspired In Memory of a Tree
In Memory of a Tree
Having just completed a long, grueling cattle drive the dirt-encrusted cowboys had been boisterously swigging whiskey shots, one after another. There was one exception to this bar hugging cluster, their point man, Juan. Short and wiry, thin as a stick, he was by far the more introverted one, who had spent the last months at the front of the cattle drive, regulating the direction and speed of the herd. Juan spent his workdays alone riding forward to their destination, with no other companionship other than that of his horse, at least until mealtimes. A human compass with an unerring sense of direction that never failed the others, he was an arrowhead that led the barreling mass of flesh onward.
Instead of joining the others, Juan sat to the left of the disheveled piano man. Leaning sideways, he gulped a cool sarsaparilla, it clutched in his chapped, cracked fingers. Despite being nearly on top the battered instrument, he still could not discern the notes over the din of his rowdy companions. Frustrated and bone weary, there was no reason to stay in the saloon even one more moment. Taking a last swallow, he tucked his worn hat tighter against the autumnal breeze and walked out into dense, fresh moon darkness.
The large mare kicked up some dust as they rode from the Flay, just outside Fort Griffin, headed towards the Guadalupe mountain range. Juan was determined to return there, a location he had found several years past. In his memory it was a peaceful oasis, a private site. His intention was to fall into a satisfied slumber as a reward of the five months of hard labor. He planned to hunker down there a few days, and rest up before heading back to the pleasures of San Francisco. The thought of unwinding in solitude had been his only goal.
Finding a secluded spot under a bluff, Juan fell asleep beneath a sturdy chinkapin oak that towered overhead, some fifty feet tall. His horse had been surprisingly uneasy so he gave into her whim and sheltered the animal a ways apart, closer to an outcrop of boulders.
He had determined the tree would offer protection from the elements. The sky held so many clouds it blocked even the dim light of the waxing moon. The gray clusters, crowded as they were, moved rapidly from the south; surely a storm was brewing. In Juan’s fatigue, he had fallen asleep oblivious to the soft, repeated drips that descended slowly but surely upon his worn Navaho blanket. The man jostled on dampened ground, in an unconscious stupor. In his uneasy dream that night, he had been fighting against a merciless flood as the sensation of wetness wormed its way upward.
As the dawn broke through the night’s curtain, Juan’s eyes opened. Still relaxed, snuggled in his bedroll, his eyes drifted through the overhanging branches until they rested on a sight that that seared into him forever after. Within the embrace of the mighty oak was held the remains of a man, swinging mutely from a sturdy noose. Swaying in the morning breeze, it was as if the air itself sought to comfort the dead. Throughout that night the man’s swollen body had been surrendering drops of human essence through the tears and rips of his mutilated humanity.
Juan did not bother with his usual morning ritual of a cup of coffee. He disregarded his intention to rest a spell. Instead, he jumped on his still fidgety horse and rode hard until he was out of Texas, leaving the blood stained Navaho blanket and his cattle driving life behind. It was time to leave the past as far away as his nightmares would allow.
— © Lucinda Abra
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